Relay Matrix Board - Eliminate wiring changes

Product Announcement from Programmable Control Systems Ltd.

The Relay Matrix Board was created as a response to the requirement of rewiring plug connections in seat test panels.

As a manufacturer of End of Line (EOL) testers Programmable Control Systems needs to connect multiple models of seats to its test equipment. Often as new models are added identical connectors with different electrical circuits are required. The traditional response was to add relays to make and break connections depending on the model of seat connected to the test equipment.

While this solution works it is not optimal. Often plug pinouts are not available until shortly before production runs, wiring of relays needs be done on weekends or other down time resulting in scheduling issues, panel space at times is limited and there are often differences between preproduction and production versions of the seats requiring additional and inconvenient changes.

After one particularly grueling and involved changeover it was decided that a "Magic Box" was needed to allow any pin on a plug to be connected to any test circuit in the panel. The creation of the Relay Matrix Board (RMB) was the result.

With 8 Inputs, 8 Outputs and 64 Form A relay contacts the RMB can connect any or all of the Output pins to any or all of the Input Pins. Each of these connection schemes is stored in flash memory as a pattern and can be selected using digital I/O or ASCII commands via RS-232.

Think of it as a Programmable Break Out Board. Once the RMB has been connected it will be no longer necessary to make physical wiring changes.

In moments connections can be rewired and patterns selected without ever opening a panel.

Onboard Microcontroller

· At the heart of the system a Rabbit 3000 series microcontroller runs the show.

· 512k Flash/512K SRAM & a powerful Rabbit 3000 microprocessor provides plenty of horsepower for control of the RMB.

Simple PLC interface

· Connection with a PLC is via digital I/O.

· All I/O is optically isolated and can be configured as either sinking or sourcing.

· Select a pattern and trigger it via outputs on a PLC.

· The selected pattern can be read by the PLC via outputs from the RMB.